St Patrick's Day and all things green

I always enjoy making a class around a special day or event. Of course St Patrick's Day is perfect with Leprechauns (photo above is of a design activity where students put jewels on the Leprechaun's cape), snakes (St Patrick apparently banished the snakes from Ireland), bogs to slip over and get stuck in as well as arms held at the sides and fast foot work as in River Dance. More complicated ideas come from Celtic Knot patterns which provide great inspiration for traveling directions across the floor for older students. All this to great music. What is there not to love? Do you have dance activities for special days? I would love to hear from you.

Rain, rain and more rain

Strange week..heaps of rain and low temps plus the holiday on Monday has made me a bit dis-orientated. Good thing my good friend and colleague, Edna, had passed on to me a class she had done recently about a Cafe where the pappadams had been burnt. When she told me of the smoky atmosphere, the flying pappadams, the sparrows pecking at the crumbs between the tables it seemed delightful and I was inspired. In reality it took quite a few classes to get the flow happening where each activity lead to the next and the dynamics contrasted. (I added a dance of busy waiters who kept tripping over and dropping the cups and saucers in their haste...see the photo above for the "trays") This is fascinating to me. Often other teachers classes seem so imaginative and full of great ideas but when I try them out with my students something doesn't quite jell for me. I have to add and subtract, tweek and twist the story to find the connection. It is the same with music. I have often arrived at Edna's studio to collect props and been swept away by music she is using but in my studio it just doesn't have the same resonance. Does this happen to anyone else? I would love to hear from you.

Vivaldi's Spaghetti Dance

It has been great fun attacking the "Housework" with everyone this week. As one of the dances we cook spaghetti. I use Vivaldi's 4 Seasons Concerto, Winter, Allegro non molto for this as it is very descriptive of the movement qualities I want the dancers to explore...stiff walking to the pot, dropping into the pot, becoming softer and rising in the pot as the spaghetti cooks before boiling over. The spaghetti then flies around the kitchen, throws itself against the wall before sliding down to the floor and being swept away to begin again. Even my wonderfully "cool" teens used it as warm up to the class. Does any one have a piece of music that they build a story around? I would love to hear from you!

Have just finished working out this week's classes.

Dragon flies, water lilies and lily pads with a few frogs for the younger dancers. Then I thought we haven't danced with the chairs for ages.....so an old fav for the older dancers! Let's see what they can do.